


Say it all again

by DawnsEternalLight



Series: The Bonds that Tie [3]
Category: Batman (Comics), DCU (Comics)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Cults, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Kidnapping, Kinda, Referenced - Freeform, Sibling Bonding, Talia al Ghul - Freeform, and also an excuse to make him talk about his mom, another one of my started short but ended up long ideas, creepy cult dudes, honestly it was an excuse to put Damian into an oversized hoodie
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-08
Updated: 2018-06-08
Packaged: 2019-05-19 18:51:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,120
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14879285
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DawnsEternalLight/pseuds/DawnsEternalLight
Summary: Jason rescues Damian from a creepy cultist and in the aftermath they talk. Well, Damian talks and Jason listens. Sometimes that's all someone really needs.





	Say it all again

**Author's Note:**

> This is set in the Losing You and Finding Us series mostly because I wanted Damian and Jason to be close like they are in that series for the stuff that's going on. But you can read it on its own if you look at it like Jason's made up with the family.

Jason pulled into the safehouse garage, keeping one arm around Damian’s waist, and killed his bike’s engine. He turned Damian towards him, pulling his arms up around his neck in as strong a hold as the drugged kid could manage. Then he hooked an arm under his brother’s legs and stepped off the bike, and kicked down the stand. Damian’s arms started to slip so Jason wrapped his now free arm around Damian’s bare back.

“-can walk,” Damian mumbled against his shoulder.

“Maybe.” Jason hummed, moving to lock the garage and start up the stairs, “But I’d rather not risk rescuing you only to have you fall down the stairs and crack your head open.”

A puff of air against his neck told him Damian wasn’t happy with the arrangements, but allowing them for the moment. That was good enough for Jason, he’d rather not deal with a drugged out squirmy ex assassin kid trying to escape his hold. It was the last thing he needed tonight. Besides, his left arm was already mad enough that he was carrying Damian instead of tending to the stab wound he’d be dumb enough to let the kidnapper get in, adding squirmy kid to that would only make it hurt worse.

He’d been distracted by what he’d seen. Just thinking about it made him tighten his grip on Damian’s back. The last thing any of them had expected was the kidnapper to be a crazy cultist intent on sacrificing a kid. Opportunist out for some quick cash? Yes. Plotting creep who'd been waiting for his chance? Sure. But guy who'd spotted a kid and thought, hey lets sacrifice that one for ultimate power? No way. It was Gotham, but even that would never be Jason's top guess. Meaning yeah, he’d been distracted and upset and sloppy. Better sloppy and take a hit meant for Damian than too slow and let his brother suffer for it. 

He had to let go long enough to unlock the building and slip in. He clicked on the light and decided the couch and single bedroom would work for the two of them. It wasn’t the safehouse Jason would have normally picked, but it was good enough. An old apartment tucked close to where he’d found Damian, but far enough out of the way of the rest of the craziness going on in the city right then.

He tapped his comms on, “Hood to Batman, Damian and I are at the safehouse.”

“Good.” Jason wasn’t going to say Bruce sounded relieved, but there was a note of that in his voice, a note almost drowned out by exhaustion.

“Want me to come help?” Jason offered.

There was a pause, other distant voices for a second, “No, we’re almost done. Red Robin and Spoiler just brought in Scarecrow.”

“Then can we move to the manor?” Jason asked. The only reason he’d come here and not gone straight home was Crane being on the loose. The last thing any of them wanted was Damian to be found then promptly hit with fear gas.

“No, I’d rather you and Robin stay there until someone can pick you up. We don’t know if this was all he had planned or the start of something.”

Robin. Jason wished Damian had been Robin when everything had gone wrong. Jason wished they’d all been in their uniforms when the news Scarecrow had broken out of Arkham and was causing havoc hit the air. Maybe then the kidnapper wouldn't have taken Damian in the middle of the chaos that erupted during fancy party they’d been at. Maybe they wouldn’t have had to split forces and could have wrangled Crane in faster. Maybe Damian wouldn’t have been almost sacrificed.

Being Robin made kidnappings easier. It was a mask, a persona, the knowledge Batman was coming for his partner. Being a Wayne was harder. Jason knew it well enough. Waiting out the hours, hoping the kidnappers didn’t get any funny ideas or impatient with Bruce. Hoping all the kidnappers wanted was money. The inability to do anything. The lack of the safety net that was the mask. It sucked just being you when kidnapped. 

“Alright, we can spend the night if need be. Dames needs to sleep off whatever the guy gave him anyway.”

“Do not.” Damian slurred, proving to Jason that yes he did.

There was an unhappy grunt from the other end of the line that promised Jason would be breaking down the whole of the rescue twice, once to Bruce and once in a report before the night was over.

Damian grumbled, pushing weakly at Jason’s chest. “Tell Father I can--.” he broke off apparently needing to think about it, before managing an “assist him.”

“Oh and Damian has a message for you,” Jason said, tightening his hold on his brother, who’d stopped pushing at him the moment Jason mentioned his name. “He says he’s tired and grateful for the rescue, and could you please send Dick instead of Tim.”

“Todd,” Damian whined, tired and upset, a small hand gripping his jacket.

“Don’t antagonize him.” Bruce hummed, “But I will send Nightwing, he’d be glad of the job.”

Glad was underselling it. Dick had been manic to get Damian back, and it had only taken mass hallucination reports to pull him off the find the baby train and onto helping Batman. That had left Jason to be the one to storm the gates or old apartment building as it had been. The plan hadn’t been for anyone to go alone, but that’s how it worked out, and Jason had been closest.

“Fine fine. Tell Dick to text before he gets here.” Jason signed off and pulled his helmet off, scrunching his nose at the air in the apartment, it was musty with disuse. He set the helmet on a shelf by the door and re-adjusted his grip on his brother.

“Sorry.” he said to Damian, “The place hasn’t been aired out in a while. The good news is they’ve picked up Crane, so you can count on Dick to come by sooner rather than later.”

Now that his duty to offer his services to Bruce was over, Damian had gone quiet again let his chin fall back against Jason’s good shoulder. He didn’t know how he’d missed it before, but his brother was shaking, little tremors running through his chest and hands where they gripped at his shirt.

“You okay?” Jason asked.

Damian didn’t respond, so Jason hefted him over to the couch and set him down, gently extracting fingers from fabric before kneeling to examine him. He hadn’t done much more than incapacitate the kidnapper and get Damian out of there as fast as possible, so he wasn’t sure how bad things were beyond the dazed look in his eyes and the red already across his chest.

He tried to glare at Jason and instead looked like he’d bitten into a lemon, his mouth twisted and eyes squinting. Jason tried not to chuckle at the look, the situation really wasn’t funny even if the face Damian was making was. Damian tried to brush off Jason’s fingers as he tilted his chin to examine his face, but his attempt was less forceful and more like a baby flopping their hand in disinterest. Aside from a bruise on his cheek and the daze he was obviously trying to fight his face looked fine. Jason was hoping the drugs would begin to wear off pretty soon. He had no way of really knowing how long it had been since Damian had been dosed. He'd gathered it was sometime before the guy had started drawing all over his chest, but Damian had been foggy on details.

Jason’s attention strayed to his arms, hair raised from the chill, and wrists bruised from the ropes the kidnapper had used on him. It was his chest Jason hurt to look at. He’d made it before anything permanent had happened, but that hadn’t stopped the man from marking him up with archaic symbols. His thumb brushed the skin above a red puckered cut, just one of a few he’d already been busy slicing into the kid’s skin, and would have finished tracing if Jason had been minutes later. He swallowed, hoping none of them scarred. He didn’t want his timing to add anything else to the patchwork across Damian’s chest.

He lingered too long looking at the white lines and pinched raised scars. Proof of training, of fights he should never have been in. Lines that told the story of a boy who just wanted to be loved and accepted by his family. Scars that didn’t stop appearing after he came to Gotham. Jason stood when his eyes caught on the starburst splotch where Damian had been stabbed through the heart.

“Let’s get you washed up, then I’ll find something for you to wear,” he said.

Jason moved to lift Damian again, but he held out a hand, “Let me.”

Something in Damian’s tone made Jason stand and step back. He could understand the need to feel in control again after a kidnapping. It must be especially frustrating for Damian. Jason hadn’t trained with the League as long as Damian had, but he knew the culture, knew the drive to be the best and never fail. He could only imagine how that feeling had been amplified towards Damian, and how he’d worked to control everything. Losing even the smallest bit of control was hard.

He let Damian push himself shakily to his feet and sway for a moment before he could stand. Damian managed a few wobbling steps before Jason had to put a hand on his back to steady him. It worried him that Damian didn’t fight the hand. It worried him more, when, a minute later he had to pick Damian up and carry him to keep him from face planting, and his brother didn’t make a sound.

He carried him to the bathroom and frowned at the tub. He wasn’t sure he could trust Damian to not end up half drowned if he left him. And even with the progress they’d made and as drugged addled, as his brain was, he was sure Damian wasn’t about to let Jason actually bathe him. He closed the lid of the toilet and set Damian on that. His brother’s eyes had gone distant again, the lull in activity as they walked apparently having stopped Damian’s fight against the drugs.

“Man. He really got you, didn’t he?” Jason sighed, and straightened to run the sink, filling it with warm water and the smallest bit of bubble bath, it smelled fruity and childish. A cheap and selfish purchase Jason liked to stock any of his old safehouses with and totally out of place to be using now. But also somehow appropriate since he was using it on a child.

He dipped a rag in and wrung it out before kneeling by Damian again, “This won’t be perfect, but it’s better than letting you die because you passed out in the bath or slipped in the shower and cracked your head open.”

Damian didn’t even flinch as he started rubbing at the dirt and grime on his face. Jason got his face clean, his cheeks a little red from the rag and water, and stood to dump the rag back in the suds. He wrung it back out and moved back to Damian. He couldn’t help but stare at the lines and words scribbled across Damian’s chest. The red puckered cuts Jason had been too late to stop.

“It would not have worked,” Damian said, voice quiet.

Jason looked up at him, frowning. Damian's eyes were on the wounds as well, distant with memory. 

“He had the incantation wrong.” Damian explained, “No matter what, he would not have gained the power he sought.”

Warm water from the rag dripped onto Jason’s thigh, “How do you know it wouldn’t have worked?” he asked.

The Al Ghuls dabbled in magic. Jason knew that knew it personally, and deeply. What he couldn’t wrap his mind around was the sudden inexplicable feeling of sick that ate at his stomach when he imagined them making Damian do anything like that. Magic was dangerous and tricky. It wasn’t something he really wanted his kid brother mixed up in if he could help it.

“I learned a bit about it. It was part of my training.” Damian answered, he was a little more alert than he’d been. His words were slow but lacked the awkwardness of a heavy tongue he’d had before.

Jason began dabbing the rag at Damian’s chest, gently across the dried blood. “Your mom didn’t make you do any of it though?”

Damian shrugged, “Not really.”

He was quiet as Jason worked on his chest. Jason was too caught up in his own thoughts to notice. His rag was rusty with blood before he noticed it, and he stopped his worrying over just _what_ they’d taught Damian about long enough to stand and rinse the rag again.

Damian cut the silence again as Jason began working on the lines on his skin. “I had to learn it,” he said.

The lines came off easily under the rag. Whatever the guy had drawn them with seemed non-permanent. Jason alternated scrubbing with dabbing at the wet to keep Damian from being soaked. He kept his mouth shut now, hoping more information from Damian might slip out.

“I needed to know everything Grandfather did. Or most of it.” Damian frowned down at his chest. “It was important for making my body into the perfect vessel for him.”

Jason gaped up at him, rag frozen against his skin, “It was _what_?”

His brother shrugged again, “Grandfather did not make me his vessel. Father helped prevent it and Grandfather found a different host. I only thought of it because you asked about magic.”

His tone was so dismissive Jason almost believed he didn’t care. Except. Damian rarely spoke about his past, and maybe it was the drugs in his system, or maybe it was the scare, but he was being pretty chatty. Jason didn’t want to miss a chance to address something that might be bothering him.

Only, Damian had apparently stopped deciding to be chatty with that revelation. No matter what form of coaxing he tried Damian didn’t respond. Jason stopped after a few minutes, choosing to focus on getting his brother as clean as he could.

“I don’t think you’ll need stitches.” Jason said, standing, “But bandages are a requirement.”

He wasn’t surprised by the lack of arguing, but that didn’t make it any less troubling. Jason was pretty sure this was more than a woozy Damian. He was bothered by the whole thing. Not that Jason was surprised.

He pulled bandages from below the sink and grabbed some antiseptic and cotton balls. When he knelt before Damian again, his brother’s hand stopped him. He looked up into a frown.

“You are hurt.” Damian’s attention was on his arm, and the slow trickle of blood still oozing from it.

Jason hadn’t bothered with it beyond yanking the knife out, and all the activity kept irritating it, but it wasn’t his arm he was worried about.

“It’s fine, just a flesh wound.” He smiled at Damian and the kid’s frown only deepened.

“Do not quote movies to distract me. I am not that-” he blinked, yawned, and screwed his face into a frown, “I’m not that out of it.” He reached up to take the antiseptic from Jason, “Let me help.”

Jason handed him the cotton balls and shrugged off his jacket, before pulling his shirt over his head, and frowning at the hole in the sleeve. He’d liked that shirt. He let Damian dab the wound clean.

“You will need stitches,” he said.

“I’ll get Alfie to do them when we head home,” Jason promised. “For now, some thick gauze and bandages should do.”

Damian’s mouth set in a line, but Jason could see the exhaustion washing over him. He was reluctant to lift his arm, let alone argue his point. He let Jason take the cotton and bottle of disinfectant. He did glare at Jason until he’d fixed up his arm first, only then did he sit back long enough to let Jason wrap his chest.

Once he was done, Jason figured it was safe to leave Damian for a few minutes to dig up something for him to wear. He seemed lucid enough, and if he did pass out, he was likely to lean back or into the cabinet next to him then fall off the toilet. Damian’s coat was lost, and his dress shirt had been practically destroyed when Jason found him. The kidnapper had torn it open, popping buttons off left and right. Only his dress pants seemed to have been spared attack, and even those were dotted with blood.

Jason changed his own clothes quickly. He then found some shorts that had shrunk one too many times in the wash and had a drawstring and a hoodie that wouldn’t totally swallow Damian.

His brother hadn’t moved from where Jason had left him. If he’d let Jason dress him he might have called Dick to tell him to get his sorry self there as fast as possible. As it was Damian managed to dress himself, and even gave Jason a sour look as he attempted to roll the sleeves high enough to reveal his hands.

He rolled them three times and Jason could see his fingers peeking out from the cuffs. Jason had to swallow a laugh, “Sorry, I don’t have anything in your size here.”

Damian huffed and crossed his arms, hands slipping into the sleeves. “Are we to stay here all night?”

“Nah, come on, we’ll chill on the couch while we wait on Dicky Boy to arrive.” Jason started to move to the door then paused, “You good?”

Damian pushed himself off the toilet and stood. He didn’t wobble like he’d done before, but Jason watched him suck in a steadying breath before he started forward. He pushed past him and into the living room where he flopped onto a couch and curled in on himself. It would be cute if he hadn’t been recently kidnapped and almost sacrificed.

Jason pulled a blanket off the back of the couch, made sure it wasn’t dusty, and draped it over Damian. He looked at him and raised an eyebrow.

“You want to read something together? I don’t keep many books here, but I can pull something up on my phone,” he asked.

Damian shook his head.

“Okay, well are you hungry?” he wasn’t, but it didn’t hurt to ask Damian.

His brother shrugged, and Jason took it as a possible yes.

“My cabinets are empty of everything but canned stuff, but there’s a late night cookie place that delivers. They do chocolate chip, and peanut butter, among other flavors. They aren’t Alfred’s, but they’re pretty good.”

Damian pulled the blanket around himself and shrugged again, “Anything’s fine.” He looked exhausted. Like a tired kid after a terrifying day, who wanted to sleep and wake up the next morning better, with the events of the day forgotten.

“Alright, how about this, I’ll let you sleep for a bit.” Jason said, “But you’re going to eat some cookies when they get here. They’re warm and I can never finish a whole order.”

Plus some sugar and something solid in his stomach might help him shake the drugs better. Jason tossed him a pillow from the couch and stepped into the kitchen to order. Then he shot Dick a text asking for an update. He learned that they were hard at work getting an antidote out to people, and he was going to try to be there in a few hours. Dick also told him Bruce wanted to remind them not to leave the safehouse without an escort in case anything else went crazy. Jason rolled his eyes but left it at that. He’d rather not fight off anything else with a half-drugged Baby Bat on his motorcycle anyway.

He flopped down next to Damian and clicked on the television, letting mindless noise wash over them. He was lucky this safehouse had one and had cable (paid for on Bruce's dime, not that he would notice unless Jason pointed it out). He didn’t always bother with a tv in some of his less used ones, but he'd had a long stay here a year earlier and got it then. He glanced over at Damian, but couldn’t tell under the mess of blanket and hoodie if his brother was awake or not.

The cookies came and Jason set them on the table. He poked at the bundle that was Damian, “Come on, kiddo. Get up and eat something. I got snicker doodle.”

A grumpy frumpled face looked up at him before Damian pushed himself up to sit, the blanket pulled around him. “Did you also order the chocolate chip?”

“And peanut butter,” Jason told him.

Damian reached for the box and pulled out one of each. He ate them quickly, then grabbed another two. Jason pulled a peanut butter before Damian downed them all. He then reached for the remote and clicked through the channels until he stopped on something animated. He didn’t care too much about the content, only that it was regular and the likelihood of creepy sacrifices was far less in a cartoon than something else.

Damian leaned against him while he finished off his last cookie. When he did, he settled closer to Jason. They watched TV in silence for a while. It was Tom and Jerry reruns. Jason chuckled once or twice, but Damian’s look had gone glazed again. Jason guessed he was lost in thought.

He was proved right when his brother finally spoke up again, “Mother did not approve of making me Grandfather’s vessel.”

Jason inched the TV volume down.

“She saved me before it happened, and sent Father after me. She even took me away during the last fight to keep me safe.” Damian pulled the blanket tighter around himself, “Sometimes I wonder if she forgot about doing all of that when she was angry at Father.”

Angry at Bruce? Then Jason remembered Leviathan, the Heretic. Damian’s death. From what he knew it all came out of her being upset with Bruce, for taking Damian, for not joining him, for a hundred things. He thought she'd had other reasons too, but the scar on Damian's chest was from family business. 

“Damian, I don’t think--”

“Grandfather was furious, but Mother did not waver. She--” Damian paused, “Grayson showed me that love is in actions, and Mother's actions then were clear.”

Damian clammed back up then, letting the noise of the television wash over them both. Jason reached out and wrapped an arm around Damian’s shoulders, tugging him close. He burrowed into Jason’s side, arms going around his waist.

“Sometimes I think about what she did for me. Even if she did forget.” Damian’s voice was quiet, muffled into the fabric.

“There’s nothing wrong with that,” Jason said, brushing Damian’s hair back. “You know she still loves you, right? Even if she’s royally screwed up a few times.”

His brother nodded. “Yeah.”

“Plus.” Jason said, leaning down to press a kiss into the crown of hair he could see,“The rest of your family loves you a whole lot.”

“Thank you, Todd.” Damian said, shifting so he was less burrowed and more snuggled, “For coming.”

“Everyone was coming for you. Crane just mixed things up a bit.”

“I know.” Damian’s voice was muffled, “Still, I am sure you would have rather gone after Crane.”

“I dunno.” Jason said, grinning down at him, “There was far less a chance I’d get hit with fear toxin going after you.”

Damian huffed, “The easy way out then.” he said, and Jason could hear the teasing in his voice.

His tone eased the knot in Jason’s stomach. Maybe he’d talked out a lot of what was bothering him. Even if it wasn’t a lot or all of it, talking out some of it helped. And Jason knew now, that meant he could help in the future.

“It’s always easier to take on a crazy cultist than a guy with fear gas. That stuff sucks.”

“There, I believe you are correct,” Damian said, and yawned.

Jason tugged him a bit closer and inched the volume back up on the television, “Get some rest, kiddo. I’ll wake you when it’s time to go home.”

Damian’s answer was a mumbled sigh into Jason’s side, followed by the light snores of real sleep.


End file.
